


home is where the heart is

by ballonlea



Category: Ensemble Stars! (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Oddball Zine Piece
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-01
Updated: 2019-12-01
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:07:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,413
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21634147
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ballonlea/pseuds/ballonlea
Summary: France was supposed to be great. And it was, for a while.But when the homesickness settled in, it seemed to have no intention of leaving.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 50





	home is where the heart is

**Author's Note:**

> hi everyone!!! i'm so happy to finally be able to post my piece from the oddball zine! i wrote this a little while ago, i think in december of 2018? and i've been d y i n g to share ever since!! please enjoy!!!

France was supposed to be great. And it was, for a while.

Shu had been enjoying studying in what might as well be the heart of high fashion. It’d been so fantastic for the first couple of months to wake up and  _ be  _ in the place he’d been dreaming about ever since he was young. He felt like even the air he was breathing was different.

He’d settled into quite a nice routine. He’d wake up, spend a few minutes getting his mind back into French-mode rather than the Japanese-mode it switched to when he stood up late speaking to friends back home. His French wasn’t stellar, but he was learning more and more every day. His roommate, an excitable blond around the same age as Shu himself, was as obsessed with Japan as he was with France. They taught each other often, which was a wonderful system for the both of them. Shu quickly added him to the list of people he could stand to be around for longer than just a few minutes.

He usually stopped by the bakery on the way to school. It was just across the street from his apartment. Croissants really  _ were  _ better here than anywhere else, even if the guy behind the counter was rather crass; some kind of ‘peaked in high school’ wannabe that spoke terribly accented French, although he  _ did  _ have a lot more vocabulary under his belt than Shu did.

Shu went through his classes rather easily. They were mostly beginning sewing classes that Shu could pass in his sleep; he’d been drafting patterns since before he was even in high school—taking a class for it was absolutely  _ not  _ necessary. But he was glad for the ease. He’d finish his class projects up quickly in the studio, and then he’d have an ample amount of time to work on personal projects.

But as the months went on, he found himself becoming rather stumped when trying to figure out what to make for himself. He had grown so accustomed to always having something to do. Between Valkyrie and anything his friends asked him to do, his queue had always been filled up. Without them, he felt like he didn’t even have any purpose in life, and keeping himself busy became quite the challenge. He’d considered writing home and asking for suggestions multiple times, but he’d talked himself out of it at the last second every single time.

Whenever he talked to his friends back home, anyway, they didn’t really talk much about sewing. Well, Mika did occasionally, asking him how to fix his thread when it got “all weird an’ tangly an’ I dunno how ta fix it or do anythin’ without ya!” It was the bobbin every single time. Shu didn’t know how to make that  _ more  _ clear.

But as for the oddballs—

Well, Shu supposed they couldn’t all call themselves “the oddballs” anymore. Yumenosaki was dead and gone for all of them except one, and that _surnom_ had fallen out of fashion without most of them there.

But as for them, they always talked in a group chat about silly things going on with them. Sometimes Natsume would message Shu privately about something or other, but it was mostly within the group chat. Shu had even learned how to use the newfangled app they used for this group chat, despite his ineptitude with technology, and staying up late to message them satisfied him well enough.

Or at least he thought it did. In reality, it’d only taken a few months before the homesickness started to settle in. Messaging his friends was all well and good, but he found himself burning to see them face-to-face more than he ever had in his life. 

Shu felt like such a failure. He was a horrible, horrible,  _ horrible  _ failure for getting homesick so quickly, especially when he was constantly talking about needing to get out of Japan, but it was why he found himself on a plane, watching as he traveled through time back home.

Over hours of reflection, the day melted into evening, and the next time he set foot on solid ground, it was in Japan. The relief felt so great that Shu thought he was actually standing up a little straighter—not like that was possible since his posture was always impeccable. Nonetheless, Shu felt a lot lighter than he had been feeling before, especially since he felt like he was already doing a lot less  _ thinking  _ than he had been doing in France. He didn’t realize how much he had to  _ think  _ whenever he read signs, overheard conversations, thought about where to go next until he was hardly thinking at all in his native tongue.

It was a welcome change, but Shu still didn’t quite feel as relaxed as he thought he would. It was still cold, although warmer than Paris, so he at least wasn’t overdressed… He sent a quick text to Mika  _ (I’m on the way home. Don’t do something absurd.)  _ only to get a response  _ (k! I left the door unlocked hehehe!!!!!)  _ in hardly any time at all. Shu was rather proud of himself for being able to type quicker than he had been able to in all eighteen years of life, but he finally thought he was getting to an acceptable typing speed.

(He felt his heart sink when he realized exactly why that was. Maybe he wouldn’t be so stupidly good at typing if he was able to see his friends in person more often. Maybe he wouldn’t be so stupidly good at typing if he’d just stayed in Japan.)

As the house came into view, Shu felt the indescribable urge to walk through the door and be wrapped up in one of Mika’s hugs. He didn’t even  _ like  _ touching people, and he did  _ not  _ still want to be seen as some sort of master to be worshipped, but if he were to speak in the terms he used to use… He definitely needed some maintenance.

He stood with his hand on the doorknob for much longer than he anticipated. It was his own house, sure, but he felt like a stranger after being away for so long. Was it really okay to just walk in? He technically didn’t belong there anymore, so would it be better to knock? He still had his key, one in a sea of many on a ring he never thought would be filled. It was nestled in the perfect middle of all of them, right in between the key to his apartment and the key to one of the campus studios, but does merely owning a key give him the right to just walk in?

Vaguely, he felt like he might have been overthinking things, so he willed himself to turn the handle and push open the door. It wasn’t like he’d see anything important; it’d just be his parents and maybe Mika, assuming the fool wasn’t overworking himself with something or other. Shu would likely just greet his parents briefly, make himself a cup of tea, and go up to his bare room and sit until the jet lag knocked him out. Resigning himself to his fate, he stepped inside.

He had to blink a few times in order to process the sight in front of him. He had expected Mika and his parents and tea and a tugging feeling of loneliness, but instead he saw his  _ friends. _

They all attempted to say “surprise” at the same time, but unsurprisingly, none of them said it at the same time. Of course they wouldn’t—when Shu wasn’t there, things were never as perfect as they could be. A group of them were precisely half a second late, causing their chorus to echo slightly, except an echo wasn’t an  _ echo,  _ an echo was screwing up,

and Shu was so, so, so unbelievably glad to hear such a failure.

He wasn’t even phased when they all came over to hug him. He expected some sort of orderly fashion, perhaps lining up to hug him one-by-one, but instead, it was all at once. As he typically did with hugs, he felt incredibly constricted for only a moment, and he relaxed.

“What?” Shu asked once they freed him, and as soon as he said it, he was incredibly aware of the fact he had gained a twinge of an accent. “I didn’t tell any of you I was coming back because  _ I  _ felt like a failure. And here you all are, welcoming me back as if I didn’t commit the biggest  _ faux pas  _ in the history of the Itsuki family name.”

His eyes settled on Kanata, who was staring at him, as he was prone to do. He blinked once, then twice, then said, “You aren’t a ‘failure’ for missing your ‘friends.’”

It was enough for Shu to let out a sigh of relief. He wasn’t sure when he started depending so heavily on their approval, but he was most definitely glad that none of them seemed to particularly care that he was visiting home so early.

And he was… Crying…?

Those were most certainly tears on his cheeks, and his shoulders were shaking, and Natsume was at his side in an instant with a box of tissues. What was this, all of a sudden? Crying? Shu didn’t  _ cry.  _ Not in front of people. Yet here he was…

“Thank you,” he said, less to Natsume and more to everyone. “All of you. I… Have no words…”

“That’s new.” Rei chuckled. The sound solidified the feeling of being home. “But you cannot only thank us. Kagehira-kun was the one to let us know you’d be stopping in.”

“S-Sorry, Itsuki-san!” Mika smiled, impish and lopsided. Shu nearly flinched at hearing his name in Mika’s voice—he’d almost forgotten that he’d told him to drop  _ Oshi-san  _ sometime between Paris and now. “I didn’t mean ta run my mouth or nothin’.”

Shu shook his head, dismissing the apology. “No need to worry, Kagehira. You did well. All of you did well.”

He felt Natsume straighten up by his side, like he was about to say something, but Wataru butted in before the boy could even open his mouth. As usual, he wore his stage presence on his sleeve. He’d been glowing since Shu stepped inside, really, his mere existence a spectacle.

It truly was a wonder he hadn’t said much until now.

“It was the least we could do for our most treasured friend!” he said, nearly sang, and took one of Shu’s hands in both of his. “Don’t you understand? Everything in the universe aligned perfectly in order for us to all meet again! We each did such a small part, aside from you, who traveled the farthest to complete our puzzle. So really, thank  _ you!” _

Shu laughed, but gingerly took his hand back. That hug was more than enough contact for the rest of the night, if Shu was to be completely honest.

“He is corRECT,” Natsume said. He stared at the tissue box he was still holding, now empty, and turned it over in his hands. “It hasn’t been the saME…”

Shu was finally allowed further into the house so that he could sit, and he was very amused at the sparse handmade decorations throughout. He could spot each party attendee’s handiwork from a mile away, but the decorations were (and Shu dared to admit it) charming. Once they were all settled on a couch too small for all of them together, Shu learned a little more about Natsume’s cryptic statement from earlier.

Things  _ hadn’t  _ been the same since Shu left. Rei explained that his departure was when everyone started to get busy. School was back into swing for Natsume, Rei had also started school (music therapy… an interesting field, though not one Shu expected for someone like him), audition season began for Wataru, and Kanata had picked up an internship of sorts at the aquarium. As Wataru put it, fate took the reigns and kept them apart. Evidently, they had all been talking in the group message as well as separately, but they hadn’t met up again as a group until…

“Until tonight,” Rei said. He was squished between Wataru and Kanata. The latter was pressed close against Shu, leaving him to wonder how he had gotten so damp when he’d presumably been close by during set-up for the party. Natsume was clinging to Shu’s other arm, and Mika had retreated to an armchair. He perched carefully at the edge, listening, but not saying much.

In turn, Shu told them as much as he could about Paris. About school, about the language, about his apartment, about the jerk across the street, about his friend—

“I didn’t think you’d be able to make another friend, Itsuki-kun.” Rei’s smirk was back, and he leaned forward to get a better look at Shu. “You aren’t forcing him, are you?”

“Don’t tease hiM.” Natsume held Shu’s arm tighter. “Obviously Shu-nii-san can make frieNDS.”

Wataru set his elbows on Rei’s back, causing the vampire to cry out. Pensively, he said, “Ah… I was surprised, too.”

“Me, too,” Kanata agreed, nodding. His cowlick bobbed along with him, and Shu realized he’d need to re-repress the urge to touch it. “Shu hates ‘people…’”

Shu rolled his eyes, but he wasn’t really upset. They weren’t exactly wrong in their assumptions. Shu himself didn’t expect that he’d be able to make a friend, either.

As the conversation winded down, people were reluctant to leave. Shu didn’t blame them; if it was up to him, then they’d all be staying right where they were for a few more hours. But the strings of fate pulled them towards their separate ways, with heartfelt promises to be back again the next evening. Kanata was the one to hurry everyone along, mentioning how Shu needed rest, and Natsume was the last to go, afraid that if he let go of Shu, he’d disappear.

Mika shooed him up the stairs, saying he’d clean up everything himself. The sudden wave of exhaustion was the only thing driving Shu to relent. He’d have to go over everything Mika attempted to clean again the next morning anyway, so retiring early couldn’t be too bad.

Shu slept easy for the first time in months. Because for the first time in months, he felt certain. For the first time in months, he felt comfort.

For the first time in months, he felt  _ loved. _

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading!! i hope you liked it!!!
> 
> [find me on twitter!!!](https://twitter.com/mezzosaka)


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